Wrestling: P’burg’s Jewel Gonzalez repeats as NJ.com Girls Wrestler of the Year

Posted Mar 18, 2020

Jewel Gonzalez of Phillipsburg celebrates her win against Amanda Pace of North Bergen in the 161-pound final of the NJSIAA Girls State Wrestling Championships at Boardwalk Hall in Atlantic City, Saturday, March 7, 2020. Gonzalez won by fall.Lori M. Nichols | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com

If girls wrestling continues to grow at the same rate it has over its first two years as an interscholastic sport -- and there is no reason to think it won't -- Jewel Gonzalez will, as time goes on, see her name move downward on lists like most individual state championships, career wins without a loss, multiple regional championship winners.

As girls became involved in wrestling at a younger age, as increased numbers of girls wrestling events provide more opportunities for more bouts and more wins, it is inevitable that Gonzalez’s 30 career wins and her two state championships will not be a benchmark for very long.

Yet there is one thing history will never be able to take away from the Phillipsburg senior. Like Neil Armstrong, Sandra Day O’Connor and Joan Benoit, Gonzalez was the first -- and always will be.

By luck of the draw, Gonzalez will always be the first two-time, girls state champion in New Jersey wrestling history. When NJSIAA assistant director Kim-DeGraw Cole selected 161 pounds as the first weight class to wrestle in the 2020 NJSIAA Girls Wrestling Championships; when Gonzalez pinned North Bergen’s Amanda Pace at the 4:28 mark, she became the first undefeated, two-time regional and two-time state champion in state history. She knows, she will not be the last.

For carving out her place in history and for her willingness to be a role model and a trailblazer for the fledgling sport, Gonzalez has been named, again, the NJ.com Girls Wrestler of the Year.

Jewel Gonzalez of Phillipsburg jumps in the ocean after she won the 161-pound state championship at the 2020 NJSIAA Girls Wrestling state championship in Atlantic City, N.J.Andrew Mills | NJ Advance Media

“I just go out and try to show everyone what I got,” said Gonzalez who will wrestle collegiately at Gannon University in Erie, Pa. “I put a lot of time in the room with my coaches and teammates. I have the the best workout partners in the state. I just want to go out and get it done.”

Her workout partners were the male members of the Phillipsburg wrestling team, one of New Jersey’s finest and most historic programs.

For Gonzalez, done meant pinning her her way through the state tournament. She made it look easy, though she claims it wasn’t.

“Everyone gets nerves,” she said. “I get butterflies, but I am confident in my abilities.”

What set Gonzalez apart from many girls wrestling in New Jersey, was her understanding of raising the bar for those who will follow.

“When you walk out on the mat and see all those eyes on you, it fills my heart with pride,” she explained. "To know girls and women back in the day didn’t have this opportunity makes me proud to live in the time we are.

“I’d describe my feeling as fulfilling,” she said, after her final bout, which gave her a 30-0 career record. "I made my mark on my school, I made my mark on New Jersey. I want girls to look at me and know they can be better than me.

"I’m just the start, she added. “These upcoming girls are going to be something to watch.”